Page 2297 - les-miserables

of age, Columbines of six, ravishing little creatures, who felt
that they formed an official part of the public mirth, who
were imbued with the dignity of their harlequinade, and
who possessed the gravity of functionaries.
From time to time, a hitch arose somewhere in the pro-
cession of vehicles; one or other of the two lateral files halted
until the knot was disentangled; one carriage delayed suf-
ficed to paralyze the whole line. Then they set out again on
the march.
The wedding carriages were in the file proceeding towards
the Bastille, and skirting the right side of the Boulevard. At
the top of the Pont-aux-Choux, there was a stoppage. Nearly
at the same moment, the other file, which was proceeding
towards the Madeleine, halted also. At that point of the file
there was a carriage-load of maskers.
These carriages, or to speak more correctly, these wag-
on-loads of maskers are very familiar to Parisians. If they
were missing on a Shrove Tuesday, or at the Mid-Lent, it
would be taken in bad part, and people would say: ‘There’s
something behind that. Probably the ministry is about to
undergo a change.’ A pile of Cassandras, Harlequins and
Columbines, jolted along high above the passers-by, all pos-
sible grotesquenesses, from the Turk to the savage, Hercules
supporting Marquises, fishwives who would have made
Rabelais stop up his ears just as the Maenads made Aris-
tophanes drop his eyes, tow wigs, pink tights, dandified
hats, spectacles of a grimacer, three-cornered hats of Janot
tormented with a butterfly, shouts directed at pedestrians,
fists on hips, bold attitudes, bare shoulders, immodesty un-

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